So, just thought I'd try some new self portraits since I got the new light. I wish I had more room in my studio to try different things...Also, I have such a hard time getting the focus right when I do self portraits! Any tips? I suppose the best would be to have another person stand where I will be and focus it...but what if I am alone?

I'm sure you have a great smile, and it would go good with the flower. What I do for self portraits is stop down my lens enough and focus in the general area that i'll be in. That way even if i'm not what my lens is focused on, the DOF distance is enough to carry pretty much everything.

In the first one you look like you're going to kill someone.
I like how the second one seems to bring out the blue in your eyes. Nice job, although they're both a little dark, which is probably something you should consider.

Thanks for the advice with the focusing issue. Makes sense, I don't know why I didn't think of that since it didn't matter too much if the black background was more in focus. Next time I'll try that. I also increased the saturation in the eyes one to help make them pop a little more.
lol...you guys are right. I guess I just wasn't as into the smiley ones today. But here's one with a grin.
Also, is it just me or does the skin look somewhat pink? Maybe I am just so used to my old icky yellow lights that I'm just not used to how the skin is supposed to look. Or maybe my skin is just kind of pink anyway.

Focus: I put a ladder in place. It has a warning label sticker with words on it. I focus on that, then make sure I stand so my face is in the same plane.

Too pink: Yes, IMO it is too pink. This may be because of white balance issues. Or possibly because digital chips capture part of the near infrared, and our eyes cant see that, so the capture looks too red for us. One method you can use to tell if its too red, if you have Photoshop, is this: make sure the info palette is showing, then use the eyedropper tool to hover over an area on the face that might be too pink. The info palette reads the cmyk values. (i.e. on the flesh between your eyes, the magenta is 37% and the yellow is 20%, which is too much magenta and not enough yellow). Most of the time, for caucasian skin, if the magenta is a higher value than yellow, then the flesh is too magenta. This is very common with digital capture. This method uses the numbers, and therefore is immune to monitor calibration issues. In other words, it works whether or not the monitor is calibrated correctly, which is significant, since all of our monitors are different.

Your self portrait is a great project. Hope you keep going with it. Also, getting the flesh tone fixed will show off those beautiful blue eyes better.

Ladder is a good idea ... I once used my vacuum cleaner to be in my spot ... and ten seconds seem short but are enough time to toss the vaccuum cleaner out of the image and place yourself in there. Though - hey - my self-portraits never look this good.

Is it maybe "not this good anymore" because I have just become TOO OLD for any pleasing self-portraits?!?!? I sometimes fear this is the case :roll:

Your lights look good in your eyes and they really highlight your eyes. I like that.

Other than that I am too unfamiliar with portraits to say much more... they are quite a bit of a mystery to me...

Basically, take your camera off the tripod and stand where you are going to stand when the photo is taken, now focus on the top of your tripod. Now put your cmera back on the tripod and it will be infocus for where you where standing.

Oh, one other tip: Leave a bit of room in the frame for cropping. You did a great job of filling the frame with meaningful content. However, many of the more popular formats (8x10 for instance) are not 2x3 aspect ratio. In that last photo, if you cropped off of the top, your head would look crowded. If you cropped off of the bottom, it would cut into the flower or crowd it.

To put it more simply, leave a bit of room on the edges of the frame so that you can print it any size you want later.

That third one is definitely a winner. As for the smiles, I don't think one has to outright smile all the time. A smirk or pleasing look works best for some. You do have a nice smile though.

The first one didn't have enough of a smile. The second one, although it shows off the flower, looks more like you're hiding behind it than smelling it.

The third one is just right.

This is very good experience to get on yourself, right? You know what to look for in your clients now!

Click to expand...

My problem is what most people have a problem with...I just don't like the way I look most of the time So that's why I was hiding in the second one. I wasn't even trying to pretend like I was smelling it. It's so much easier to take pictures of other people though. It's hard to direct yourself and see what looks the best. I'm liking the tips I've gotten on the focusing issue though. I'm sure I'll be trying again sometime in the future.